RIC Chicago Sky

The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) Express women’s wheelchair basketball team is now officially renamed the RIC Sky.
The Chicago Sky and the RIC Sky aim to spread the game of basketball to girls and women throughout the Chicago area. Both organizations strive to educate and encourage girls and young women to participate in competitive and recreational sports, including young women with a physical disability.

The RIC Sky won the National Championship in 2005 and finished third in 2004 and 2006. The Express has contributed several players to the national team roster, including current USA National Women’s Team member Becca Murray and alternates Shawna Culp and Gina Wehling. Culp recently signed a national letter of intent to play wheelchair basketball for the University of Illinois Fighting Illini. The RIC Sky plays exhibition games throughout the area to create awareness among the general public regarding sport for people with disability, wheelchair accessibility, to raise funds for its programs, and to change people’s attitudes toward person with a disability.

For more than 25 years, women and girls with a physical disability in the five-state region of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri and Wisconsin have had the opportunity for fitness, competition and fun through member teams of the National Wheelchair Basketball Association (NWBA), a fifty-nine year old association comprised of 214 teams in the USA and Canada.

RIC Sky is sponsored by the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago through its Virginia Wadsworth Wirtz Sports Program. The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC) is ranked the number one rehabilitation hospital in America for the 16th consecutive year as reported in the July 'Best Hospitals' issue of U.S.News & World Report.

“We join with the RIC Sky to encourage Chicago women and girls to reach for their dreams of becoming an athlete, whether it is basketball or another sport,“ said Margaret Stender, Sky CEO. “We are extremely proud of this relationship and the RIC Sky women, who are inspiring women with the courage, strength and optimism that we strive for on our team.”